I remember a poster on the walls of the biology departments of two universities I attended. What Can You Do With A Biology Degree, it said, with lots of careers listed. It of course didn't say that the degree needed was a PhD, with a fellowship or two desired, unless you wanted to be a lab rat for a third of the pay and let your PhD boss get all the cash an credit.

When I decided to leave my lab rat job and get a professional degree, there were half a dozen people with masters degrees and 2 PhDs (hoping for a fellowship of some sort) applying for it.

Eighteen year old kids are dumb, and even dumber when it comes to money. Whoa.

I'm actually surprised that it's only 1 in 8 and not more. Iowa State must be doing a pretty good job of informing their kids, and it seems like they're striving to do better.

I mean, there are some private for-profits that will include, in their fine print, permissions for them to go out and take private loans in your name (and with banks that have astronomical interest rates and special deals with the schools) automatically if your FA doesn't cover the full cost of tuition. They even sometimes market their degree programs as "free" or use tricks like "quarter credit hours" to make their tuition costs seem artificially low (or they just never tell you; try finding out what Kaplan's tuition is just by browsing Kaplan.edu).

So, compared to that level of predatory free-market cynicism, Iowa State seems practically angelic.

Booface1985: Eighteen year old kids are dumb, and even dumber when it comes to money. Whoa.

Yet, strangely, when they fail to pick the "right" major, we're appalled and for some strange reason, feel we were more intelligent at that age.

Ah me...

atomsmoosher:

So basically, you're in debt because your mom's a crack whore...essentially. I don't think that's typical. And nowadays, $33K is nothing. That wouldn't cover a year at some private colleges.

Now the inevitable: what was your major?

B.A.'s in History and Political Science.

Picked up an A.A.S. in Intelligence Operations as credit for my military training.

Now putting in applications for graduate programs to use my military educational benefits. Looking at getting a Master of Public Administration degree.

Somacandra: FTFA: Enrollment in a for-credit personal finance course is growing steadily

Why these aren't already required in order to be graduated from high school, I have no idea.

It was in my high school, but only for the kids who weren't in college track math.

Senior Advanced Math - personal finance, budgeting, interest calculations, all the geometry a construction worker needs to know, stuff like that.

Silverstaff: atomsmoosher:

So basically, you're in debt because your mom's a crack whore...essentially. I don't think that's typical. And nowadays, $33K is nothing. That wouldn't cover a year at some private colleges.

Now the inevitable: what was your major?

B.A.'s in History and Political Science.

Picked up an A.A.S. in Intelligence Operations as credit for my military training.

Now putting in applications for graduate programs to use my military educational benefits. Looking at getting a Master of Public Administration degree.

Ahh...you'll be fine if you're clever enough. Did you intern anywhere as an undergrad? I think most kids neglect that the best jobs come through networking, and connections generally need to be earned if they aren't given on a silver platter.

atomsmoosher: I have no pity for the English major who leave school with few useful workplace skills and 100 grand in debt.

Neither would I. That's why when I got my bachelors and masters in English, I paid for it entirely through scholarships, assistantships, fellowships, and side-jobs as an editor, teacher, and (weirdly) tax preparer. I did take out subsidized student loans, but that was so I could invest the money during my six years of study and pay it back in full at the end, keeping the interest I had earned in the meantime. I ended up helping my parents out of a bad financial situation with that student loan money.

I doubt many English majors have any illusions about their choice of careers. They choose it because that's what they love to do. In my case, it was a few years surrounded by people who also enjoyed writing, getting paid to teach or work as an editor, while I put together a collection of short stories and essays and worked on a novel.

And about liberal arts majors who were "outright gleeful of their ignorance," I think that's more a sign that you were hanging out with shiatty people. Most liberal arts folks idolize this guy, and most of the liberal arts folks I hang out with have major interests or even advanced degrees in other fields as well. After all, if you're going to be a writer, you've got to have something interest to write about. I've met my share of STEM mouthbreathers--enough to know that no field is immune to stupidity.

Booface1985: I doubt many English majors have any illusions about their choice of careers. They choose it because that's what they love to do. In my case, it was a few years surrounded by people who also enjoyed writing, getting paid to teach or work as an editor, while I put together a collection of short stories and essays and worked on a novel.

Good for you.

And about liberal arts majors who were "outright gleeful of their ignorance," I think that's more a sign that you were hanging out with shiatty people. Most liberal arts folks idolize this guy, and most of the liberal arts folks I hang out with have major interests or even advanced degrees in other fields as well. After all, if you're going to be a writer, you've got to have something interest to write about. I've met my share of STEM mouthbreathers--enough to know that no field is immune to stupidity.

And I would agree, no field is immune. Engineers, in particular, I've found are more prone to magical thinking, for example.

I was working on my MA just after the Sokal Affair came to light, and judging by the backlash around the English Department, the attitudes toward science and scientists wasn't as enlightened then.

umad: rewind2846: What we leave behind are our ideas, not our buildings...

It's getting deep in here. I should have worn some hip-waders.

uwet?

atomsmoosher: Ahh...you'll be fine if you're clever enough. Did you intern anywhere as an undergrad? I think most kids neglect that the best jobs come through networking, and connections generally need to be earned if they aren't given on a silver platter.

Most of these conversations ignore facts like this. The degree is important, but not as important as who you are.

My wife has a BFA in painting. Seven years ago she became director of an NPO, making 90k. Her degree prepared her for little of the challenge, but it turns out she can shake hands and look you in the eye, sell, crunch numbers and project, prognosticate, speak well in front of a crowd. All things she has a talent for, not a degree of. Oh and she quit her job last year to start her own company. She has never taken a business course and she is cash positive.

Choose your major through reflection and good judgment, but don't expect it to autopilot you to the promise land.

August11: The degree is important, but not as important as who you are.

....

Choose your major through reflection and good judgment, but don't expect it to autopilot you to the promise land.

There kids, that's your life lesson for today.

rewind2846: Somacandra: FTFA: Enrollment in a for-credit personal finance course is growing steadily

Why these aren't already required in order to be graduated from high school, I have no idea.

Maybe it's because the world doesn't need everyone to be engineers. Such knowledge is not a bad thing, but unfortunately the overall effect would be to scare most of these kids into just a few vocations and leave other majors to rot, which is not a good thing. Indread of teaching these kids to be smart about student loans and their consequences, if taught by people like the ones who haunt these forums it will be an excuse to push these highly impressionable and malleable minds away from their hopes and dreams and into early dronehood, where they will spend the next 40-50 years as another cog in the machines of the wealthy.

scene: high school counselor's office, 2016:
"Don't take that major! You'll never ever ever ever pay of your student loans!" *whacks with rolled-up newspaper*
"OW! But I can draw and paint and animate, and I'm good at it!"
"Doesn't matter! *whack* You'll take this calculus and like it, then become an oil sands engineer up in Assfreezer, Canada!"
"Why would I do that?" *whack* "Hey!"
"Because we said so! We are the market, and the reason you're spending all this money in the first place is to get training we're too cheap to provide! Now shut up and crunch those numbers!"

But the FARK hive mind firmly believes that it it's not a STEM course it ain't sh*t, so maybe the world will be better off without artists and historians and people who study literature and languages and philosophy and all the other things that make our civilization "civilized" as their life's work.

Who need that sh*t anyway... ooh look! Ow My Balls is on!!

SO MUCH MOTHERFARKING THIS.

Speaking as someone with female Asperger's, you guys lie as much as the 'English and Arts 4Eva!!11!' group. There are actual jobs out there for high-level English and Art degrees. It just requires some work.

Also, I'm fairly sure TFA's problem has less to do with 'college students stupid' and more to do with 'when no one teaches you how to do something, then expects you to do it without any support the first time around, you're gonna fark it up'. Seriously, this is the first loan ever and you think they're going to do it right?

KiplingKat872: A working knowledge of history would be useful when, oh, this nation decides to invade a small country in the Middle East that was nation-built by the British after they threw an arbitrary line around three disparate peoples and then watched it collapse into Civil War within a couple decades after they left.

The people who whined "WHY DO THEY HATES US!?!?!" after the september 11th attacks were the ones who didn't pay attention in world history, U.S. history, social studies, or world religions classes.

August11: The degree is important, but not as important as who you are.

And by proxy, who you know, who you blow, etc. Good 'ol boy nepotism comes in real handy too.


August11: Most of these conversations ignore facts like this.

I suspect there's more than a few 800-pound gorillas in the room here.* Offhandedly I'd say one of the chubbier ones is the fact that we currently exist in a Employer's job market. If you happen to meet an employer who actually cares about "who you are", they are, at this time, considerably less induced to bother trying to find out.



*None of them are ur mom.

jack21221:

Your post has NOTHING to do with the post you quoted. You know that, right? This is the conversation that just actually happened.

Yes, it does. The issue I posted about related to this particular conversation was not WHETHER such financial literacy should be taught, but HOW it should be taught.
It is one thing to teach high school kids about how loans, compound interest and payment plans work (good), and another to teach them not to enter certain fields because they will be living in a cardboard box for the rest of their lives if they do (bad).

The first scenario makes sense in the real world, and the second makes sense only on FARK, where any vocation that is not a STEM job is subject to the hatred of a thousand suns for some strange reason. Here, I'll even reprint the phrase for you, since your reading comprehension might be a bit lacking today:

"Such knowledge is not a bad thing, but unfortunately the overall effect would be to scare most of these kids into just a few vocations and leave other majors to rot, which is not a good thing. Instead of teaching these kids to be smart about student loans and their consequences, if taught by people like the ones who haunt these forums it will be an excuse to push these highly impressionable and malleable minds away from their hopes and dreams and into early dronehood, where they will spend the next 40-50 years as another cog in the machines of the wealthy."

Non sequitur? Not really.

atomsmoosher: Ahh...you'll be fine if you're clever enough. Did you intern anywhere as an undergrad? I think most kids neglect that the best jobs come through networking, and connections generally need to be earned if they aren't given on a silver platter.

Yeah, but not as useful a networking opportunity as you might think. I interned for the local prosecutor's office in my hometown. He was out of office by the time I graduated.

I used to want to go to law school, even took the LSAT and did decently well (67th percentile IIRC). The PoliSci degree was pretty heavily slanted toward pre-law type courses (Constitutional Law, Civil Liberties, Legal Philosophy, Legal Research, Judicial Process, ect.). I interned in a law office to see the more practical end of law. When I graduated, he wasn't hiring, and I really REALLY didn't want to have to work in that small town. I realized that law school was no guarantee of a job anymore either, and going to law school for 3 years and around $100k of debt would suck with the way the legal job market looked (seriously overcrowded).

I'm currently a peace officer and in the National Guard, looking to move up to a three-letter agency once I get my Master's degree.

Dancin_In_Anson: KiplingKat872: All you FYIGM types act like everyone today could do it the way you did it 20-plus years ago, refusing to acknowledge to tuition prices spiralling out of control vs. stagnant wages and a shiatty job market.

Guess what. You can. It just takes a little effort. Now I know that it should just be handed to you because, after all, you are you and you (deserve, have a right to or whatever) but as i said earlier, it just doesn't work like that.

Really dumb argument. No one is expecting to be "handed" anything, nor do they think they have the "right" to a better life. Problem is that once upon a time a decent job and the possibility of a better life was there for you to reach for if you got off your ass, studied hard, paid your dues and networked. That time is quickly becoming the past, and even the hardest workers struggle to gain a middle-class foothold in this society today.

In the past the door was there, and all they had to do was use their education to open it for themselves... now that door is locked, padlocked, nailed shut, boarded over, bricked up, slathered with quick-setting concrete, and has a one inch thick hardened steel blast door welded in place.

Of course those who had it easier when all that was needed was a key will b*tch about how these damn kids "want everything handed to them"...

InfamousBLT: It was mostly the result of arguing with 2 people at once.

I thought the sign at the door said 4 minimum

Maybe their helicopter parents handled too much for those "one in eight" and just told them where to sign.

jnapier: 100% true story

Went to a yogurt shop and the bill was $7.50.
Before I gave her the money she rang up the $7.50 as exact change.
I gave her $10.50 and she could not figure out what the change was. After a couple of minutes of fretting the people behind us shouted out; "It's Three Dollars~!. The change is three dollars"

She looked up and said; "I went to art school, not math school"

I am still stunned by this every time I tell people about what happened.

In getting my Graphic Design degrees, I took two semesters of algebra, one of macroeconomics and one of statistics. The lowest grade I got was a "B+" in macro, and that was because the instructor was an asshole who failed over half the class.
Your "artists r so stoopid" anecdote fails on multiple levels.

Well they *were* planning on having started their own plumbing business by now.
But taxes and regulations and Russia from my porch -- so vote Romney.

umad: It was dead nuts on for you

unuts?

Dancin_In_Anson:

rewind2846: Of course those who had it easier when all that was needed was a key will b*tch about how these damn kids "want everything handed to them"...

Or those that biatch about how haaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrd life is and how those goddamn old people had it so easy.

They did have it easier, education-wise. Case in point: my father, who grew up in the segregated south and was only able to achieve an 8th grade education, worked his way up through the ranks at the transit company where he was employed and retired ten years ago as lead engineer for the entire southern district.
They guy they replaced him with had two college degrees, one in business and one in electrical engineering, and still had to have his hand held by the people my father used to work with.

As little as fifteen years ago a person could work over the summer (there were many more jobs available) to earn enough money to pay for tuition and books at the local state college where I live without having to resort to student loans. No more, as tuition has quadrupled (along with everything else) and jobs which pay enough to cover these expenses are becoming as scarce as the proverbial hen's teeth as boomers hoard their positions instead of moving on so that jobs open at the bottom end.

The history of the last 100 years is replete with stories of people who made it just fine without college or even high school, some even becoming quite wealthy in the process. You will not find to many of these tales these days. What sort of job can you get with an eighth grade education today?

umad: rewind2846: Your "artists r so stoopid" anecdote fails on multiple levels.

It was dead nuts on for you, or would have been if that was what his post was actually implying. I do find it really really funny that you think taking a couple of algebra classes makes you some kind of exception to this imagined slight. Most of us STEM folks were done with algebra in middle school.

College algebra? Not likely, unless you went to college at 14. I took algebra classes in eighth and ninth grade as well, like most students did. And yes, you're stupid for believing him.

If the anecdote is true (doubtful, but let's pretend) this person behind the counter might have had other things on her mind when asked to make change, or was simply not adept at math, neither of which had anything to do with "art school". The entire "story" was just another attempt to denigrate those people involved in the arts as their life's work, and for no other reason. Point is she was the exception, and not the rule as the anecdote implies and you seem to want to believe.

So you can take your STEM, and jam it squarely up your ass. Artfully, of course.

KiplingKat872: Dancin_In_Anson: KiplingKat872: Have fun bootstrappy, FYIGM old folks. You'll be supporting your kid's arses for ten years after school.

Mine got a worthwhile degree and is doing quite well, thanks.

The whole notion that you HAVE to obtain a college degree to survive or somehow have a RIGHT to one is the root of the problem.

I have had this argument on Fark many, many times before. With the much of the manufacturing shipped overseas, there are not enough trade jobs to support the middle and lowers classes anymore. And now because the job market is so competitive, employers are asking for a BA to do clerical or administrative work a savvy high school graduate could do. Does one really need an MBA to be what amounts to a salesman? I don't think so, but a lot of places want to see it before they hire someone.

So kids pretty much are forced to go to college to make a living wage, a gamble their parents, high school guidance counselors, and the college told them would pay off. Only with the wages stagnating and the unemployment so high, it didn't.

Truth = KiplingKat872

/and for shame to you folks who are so proud of not having debt... because someone else paid for it for you back when you could pay for rent and a car on a mcdonald's check. it is not 40 years ago. it is now.

KarmaSpork:
We help with school. We don't reward ignorance. They know what non-dischargable debt is. My oldest struggles, my youngest (at 19) has 2 years of tuition saved and started her retirement.

I did ...

It sounds like you're doing it the right way, instead of the special snowflake must be helicoptered way. Thank you for doing so.

Dancin_In_Anson: KiplingKat872: Thanks for ignoring everything I said and reality, and you all wonder why people hate conservatives so much.

What? Are you too good to work at 7-11?


SkunkWerks: If you don't either, how do you know he doesn't know?

I'm sure he's a modern day Tom Joad.

I work at a university, you twit. Had you bothered to read what I wrote I told you I was employed, you farkwit. Doing office work that could have been done by a smart high school graduate, but they required a BA for a job that pays 27k a year before taxes. As for part time work, good luck in a small college town where all the part time jobs are being worked by the students who make up 2/3 of the population.

If the only way you can argue to create condescending strawmen in direct conflict with a statenent made minutes before, you are the bigger moron than skinnyhead.

Dancin_In_Anson: rewind2846: They did have it easier, education-wise. Case in point: my father, who grew up in the segregated south and was only able to achieve an 8th grade education, worked his way up through the ranks at the transit company where he was employed and retired ten years ago as lead engineer for the entire southern district.
They guy they replaced him with had two college degrees, one in business and one in electrical engineering, and still had to have his hand held by the people my father used to work with.


Which tells me that the new dude wasted his money. He would have done just as well to do as your Father did.

I would imagine the employer required the degree. Most of them do these days.

Welcome to the modern American job market, otherwise known as reality. It's missed you.

Look man, someone has to be mopping the floor so that the skilled labor is free to be up front saying, "Would you like fries with that?"

My Dad only had a BS in Physics and worked his way up through engineering firms fine...starting in the 1970's. When they replaced him 20-plus years later, it was with a newly minted Ph.D. at half the salary. Now it's even worse.

That's the way it works now, you need a degree just to get your foot in the door and the Universities have a captive market while tuition spirals out of control and predatory lenders like Sallie Mae troll for the desperate and/or stupid.

umad: You can stay here and keep playing the victim. Poor little you. Boo hoo.

Victim? I suggest you go back upthread and read the post where I explain how much I make, only a few years after leaving college. Not a lot, but a good living. Go ahead, I'll wait.


Now, as for those "language arts skills"... maybe if you had paid more attention in those classes you might be able to read and comprehend for deeper meaning rather than the superficial and simplistic explanations you seek to employ in your understanding of this "story". To be able to understand and interpret the world around you is the real hallmark of a college education, one that seems to have been lost on you in favor of "makin' mad crazy dollahz". More's the pity.

KiplingKat872: My Dad only had a BS in Physics and worked his way up through engineering firms fine...starting in the 1970's. When they replaced him 20-plus years later, it was with a newly minted Ph.D. at half the salary. Now it's even worse.

That's the way it works now, you need a degree just to get your foot in the door and the Universities have a captive market while tuition spirals out of control and predatory lenders like Sallie Mae troll for the desperate and/or stupid.

You work in a university, so you are part of the education-industrial complex. You are part of the problem.

I think most of those 1 of 8s are in this thread

84Charlie: KiplingKat872: My Dad only had a BS in Physics and worked his way up through engineering firms fine...starting in the 1970's. When they replaced him 20-plus years later, it was with a newly minted Ph.D. at half the salary. Now it's even worse.

That's the way it works now, you need a degree just to get your foot in the door and the Universities have a captive market while tuition spirals out of control and predatory lenders like Sallie Mae troll for the desperate and/or stupid.

You work in a university, so you are part of the education-industrial complex. You are part of the problem.

Right, the student services person in the Chemistry Department has a lot of power over how much tuition costs or lending.

You slept through the "critical thinking" portion of your English Comp class, didn't you?

Dancin_In_Anson: KiplingKat872: I work at a university, you twit. Had you bothered to read what I wrote I told you I was employed, you farkwit. Doing office work that could have been done by a smart high school graduate, but they required a BA for a job that pays 27k a year before taxes. As for part time work, good luck in a small college town where all the part time jobs are being worked by the students who make up 2/3 of the population.

7-11 is hiring. And before you get all indignant on me, I bloody well mean it. People like me who had it so farking easy 30 years ago didn't mind working at the 7-11 or McDonalds (currently starting at $11+ per hour in Abilene, Texas) or a vineyard...a place where I learned to respect the people who could barely speak English more than whiny little shiats who think they have it rough.

KiplingKat872: If the only way you can argue to create condescending strawmen in direct conflict with a statenent made minutes before

Oh?

KiplingKat872: I would imagine the employer required the degree. Most of them do these days.

Welcome to the modern American job market, otherwise known as reality. It's missed you.

ExperianScaresCthulhu: Truth = KiplingKat872


Oh bullshiat. And I posted a link that addresses your fatalistic views very early in this thread.

You made a choice to take the path that you took just as I did. How you deal with it is what will make or break you.

Guess what? 7-11 isn't in everywhere. And with 9.7% unemployment, competion for quickiemart jobs is pretty stiff.

You're a testament to why this nation is going down the tubes. "I deny reality and substitute my half-baked opinions. They have nothing to do with real life, but I get to shore up by flaccid ego with self-righteousness."

Dancin_In_Anson: KiplingKat872: My Dad only had a BS in Physics and worked his way up through engineering firms fine...starting in the 1970's. When they replaced him 20-plus years later, it was with a newly minted Ph.D. at half the salary.

Bad decision on the part of the PhD...especially in the late 90s. Just goes to show that getting advanced degrees is not an indicator of intelligence.

They wouldn't have given the kid the job without the Ph.D. It was required to apply. Just like I had to have a BA to get my office job.

Reality really is too much for you, isn't it?

KiplingKat872: 84Charlie: KiplingKat872: My Dad only had a BS in Physics and worked his way up through engineering firms fine...starting in the 1970's. When they replaced him 20-plus years later, it was with a newly minted Ph.D. at half the salary. Now it's even worse.

That's the way it works now, you need a degree just to get your foot in the door and the Universities have a captive market while tuition spirals out of control and predatory lenders like Sallie Mae troll for the desperate and/or stupid.

You work in a university, so you are part of the education-industrial complex. You are part of the problem.

Right, the student services person in the Chemistry Department has a lot of power over how much tuition costs or lending.

You slept through the "critical thinking" portion of your English Comp class, didn't you?

You stated that you worked for a university and did not say what you did until the reply. You are still part of the problem. Your departmental beast needs constant feeding and you will want more and more money. This leads to tuition increases that cause students to get bigger loans and continue the cycle.

There's a shortage of truck drivers in this country. Some companies not only pay for training but guarantee a job upon completion.

Dancin_In_Anson: 30 years ago

Grandpa on another one of his rants. Yes, I'm sure a strong back and a knowledge of buggy whips was all it took to make it back in your day. You don't understand why kids just don't do that. Blah blah farking blah.